“The way Miley Cyrus has been allowed to dominate months of necessary discussion about young women and what they do, about sex and celebrity and the pounding synthetic intersection of the two which is pop music is the ultimate example of our guilty, horny fascination with young girls’ sexual self-exploitation. We have discussed Miley Cyrus as a cipher for precarious womanhood everywhere to the extent that she has functionally become one.

“The ongoing Miley conversation is concern-fapping made flesh. Miley is not the only very young woman doing bold, original or shocking things in public right now, but she’s the one who gets to sum up all girls everywhere. Miley, not Lorde. Miley, not Daisy Coleman. Miley, not Malala Yousafsai. Miley, not Chelsea Manning.

“Of course, young trans women and women of colour, however heroic, could never be everygirl. That’s why Rihanna only gets to be a ‘bad influence’ on girls, but Miley somehow is all girls. She is the way we want to imagine all girls – slender young white innocence forever being corrupted, allowing us to stroke out another horrified concerngasm.” [New Statesman]

“In The Ethical Slut, perhaps the best-known ‘catechism’ of progressive sexual morality, Dossie Easton and Janet Hardy make the case that ‘the fundamental sexual unit is one person; adding more people to that unit may be intimate, fun, and companionable, but it does not complete anybody.’ Masturbation matters, they argue, not merely because it helps you learn what you want sexually from a partner, but because it helps bring ‘your locus of control into yourself.'” [The Atlantic]

“As writer Amanda Marcotte says, laughing in recollection, ‘We had a running joke about how every three months, another guy would publish a post about “Why don’t women blog?” And we would all comment, “We’re out here; fuck you!”’” [New York Magazine]

“Should Michele Bachmann Quit?” Probably, because “barring everyone else dying or converting to Islam, it’s pretty obvious at this point that Michele Bachmann will not be the Republican party’s 2012 Presidential nominee.” Yay! [Jezebel]

“Until the woman who doesn’t want to be seen as sexually available can go out with certainty that she won’t be harassed or ogled, your choice to turn heads and revel in attention is a privileged one. Until the woman who doesn’t prioritize appearance gets taken just as seriously in just the same contexts, it’s a privileged choice to achieve certain standards of beauty. You may be doing what you love, but you’re also doing what you’re told.” [XOJane]

“At this point, the most noteworthy thing about someone doing something with someone else’s privates is the fact that we still make such a big fucking deal about it. Yes, that’s a penis. Yes, that’s a woman’s mouth. Yes, that’s ejaculate. Let’s all carry on with our daily lives and quit acting like we’ve never seen a blow job before. Move along, folks. Nothing to carry on about here. Literally hundreds of people are getting blow jobs right this second. By the end of the day, thousands of people will have received blow jobs. Maybe you’ll get a blow job! Maybe you’ll give one. Maybe you’ve already given or gotten one today. But enough with the gathering, giggling, judging, and Tweeting.

“There are real things going on in the world. Kardashians are getting divorced.” [Jezebel]